I am back!!! And I have a new MemoryWorks Personal Consultant Website!

I have been away for quite a while.  Mostly because I took a break from crafting this summer and spent a lot of time with the kids at the pool or travelling.  But I am back and should be up to par again soon.  I want to start by giving you the address for my MemoryWorks Personal Consultant Website.  There you can view and order our products and/or book a party (on line parties are fine).  I will be updating the site with lots of goodies in the next few weeks too.

So thanks for hanging in there and I will be back soon!

Here is the address  Ann's MemoryWorks Website

That’s Hot! Blog Hop…. Welcome!

Here it is, the moment we have all been waiting for!  Our day of some fun blog hopping.  Today you will see a wide array of projects that are “HOT”.  Enjoy the hop and please be sure to leave comments for each of the participants, we LOVE comments.  Feel free to become followers of our blogs too, if you wish.  Thanks for stopping by!

If you came from Debbie  you are right on track.  If you are just stopping here please go back to Yolie, our first stop on the hop and follow the order from there.

Our lineup:

Yolie

Xochitl

Tammy

Angie

Celeste

Debbie

Ann YOU ARE HERE

Maria GO HERE NEXT

Ashley

Christel

Jani

Sherry

Monica

Melin

Gaby

Here is my That’s Hot!  layout.  This shows my husband and son about 10 years ago.  I thought it was so sweet that hubby set up a tent and got all the bath tub toys out and got in the pool with him.  My son, Griffin was afraid of water so this was a big deal, no tears here.

I used American Crafts summer collection appropriately called Heat Wave.  I also got out the stickles because I don’t do too much without them!  I couldn’t resist adding some of my favorite button embellishments either so they could “float” in the waves.

Thanks for stopping by and be sure to go see Maria after my page!  (please leave me some love and become a follower of my blog if you wish)

 

A Reminder About That’s Hot Blog Hop This Saturday!

Hi to my blog friends!  First I will remind you that the That’s Hot Blog Hop starts this Saturday, August 6 at 2 a.m. central.  I am a part of this wonderful hop so please stop by here to see what I have made to share with you.  We have a wonderful line-up of blog participants and our ever wonderful and talented hostess is Yolie from JustYolie.com    Please stop by and be sure to start at the beginning which is of course, Yolie’s blog.  Be sure to leave all of us lots of love a long the way, we appreciate that.

On to other matters…. we survived the Clinton County Fair in mid-July.  I got all blue ribbons for my creations that I entered which will be posted later today, hopefully.  They were 3 double-layouts, 3 single layouts and also 3 photographs that were taken on my vacation.

My children did well too. I am so proud of all 3 of them.  Griffin, who just finished 7th grade, entered a trio of photos that he took at the Quad City Air Show in June.  The pictures are some very awesome aerial shots of non other than the Navy’s own Blue Angels.  His photo trio, which was cleverly matted, got State Fair consideration.  That was so exciting because he had never used the camera before that day (it was my new one).  He has a very good eye for picture taking.  This was his 3rd year in 4H and the fair.

The twins also did well and it was their first year to be in 4H and be judged.  They had previously been in Clover Kids which is for K-3 but are not judged, and only got participation ribbons those years.  However, this year Gretchen did a decopauge project out of a wooden letter G for her room and got a red ribbon (though I really don’t agree with the comments she was given- but live and learn) and her photo that she also used my camera for the first time, took a blue ribbon.  Gillian entered a wonderful project that was done for school in the spring. It was a state float and was very well researched and put together. She got a blue ribbon.

School starts in just 13 days here.  I hope the heat will subside because not all the kids have air conditioning in the school right now.  We have had over 2 weeks of 90 plus heat and it is miserable.  We actually found it too hot to go to the pool, as did many around our area.  Several city pools dumped ice in the water to cool it down but a few of them had to close because even that didn’t work!

Griffin is in Colorado with 14 other members of our church’s youth. They are in Estes Park at a Youth Conference for our denomination which is CLB or Church of the Lutheran Bretheran .  I know they are having a wonderful time.  They are expected back late Sunday, as it is a 14 hour plus drive.  Thanks go to our Youth Pastor Jason and Youth Coordinator, Pam for driving this lively bunch out and back and giving them such a wonderful experience.

The best part about the trip that Griffin is taking is that he almost didn’t get to go.  Just a week before they were to leave he had a pretty bad seizure and it was the first one in almost 2 1/2 years.  We did a lot of praying and decided that he would be ok to still attend the conference.  He is ok and as long as he doesn’t forget to take his meds, he should continue to remain ok.  I know it scared him so I think he understands that when we ask if he took his medicine he better not say yes when he means no.  It is so hard with a 13 1/2 year old because you constantly remind him and he gets a little angry and then you decide to let him to let him be responsible on his own and he slips up and HE pays the price.

Well, talk to you later.  Don’t forget the  Blog Hop!

--- ScrappinAnn

Sorry I have been away….

Hey Blog Followers!  I am still here, just not “here”.  Summer has taken over my life.  Well, my kids and summer that is.  We have spent a week in Florida and did 6 parks in 6 days and now we are right in the middle of county fair.  Stay tuned I will be back in August.  Be sure to join me for the That’s Hot Blog Hop!

Glitter Explosion Blog Hop!!!

Welcome to the Glitter Explosion Blog Hop!

This hop will have projects that are all sparkling with glitter. Please be sure to make it all the way through the hop. You should have come to my blog hop from http://angie-scrappinmemories.blogspot.com/ . If you didn't please make sure you go to the start of the hop at Just Yolie so you won't miss out on a thing. There will be candy on the hop.

 

Look at those clothes from the 1970’s!  Peace, Love and GLITTER! 

A Close-Up on my Groovy Paper.  There is glitter on the flowers, peace signs and stripes!

 

 

The title of my layout is “Those 70’s Friends”.

The two pages show my same  childhood friends throughout the 70’s.

(K-5th Grades)

Most of the pictures are of my birthday parties.

A close-up of my Petaloo glitter and bling flowers and more on my paper.

I cut out flowers from the paper and popped them up, added more glitter and bling.

Then we can “Flash Forward to the 80’s”.  I moved away to a new school but still kept in touch

with “Those 70’s Friends”.  We got together on my birthday and in the summer as much as possible.

 

These two layouts are glitter paper and glitter flowers, glitter

chipboard pieces and glitter Thickers.

A leak in my ceiling ruined the top of the 2nd page but I didn’t have time to re-do it, sorry.

Sooooo……  That brings us to the last thing….. the line-up for the hop!

Yolie – www.justyolie.com  START HERE

Gaby – www.gabycreates.com

Lenea  - http://sugargemscrafts.blogspot.com/

Xochitl - http://cricutcritter.blogspot.com/

Angie - http://angie-scrappinmemories.blogspot.com/

Ann -  http://annlenth.blogspot.com/   YOU ARE HERE!!

Mari - http://mariaschulz.blogspot.com/  GO HERE NEXT

Debbi - http://www.scrappingmamma.net/

Sherry - http://patternsbysher.blogspot.com/

Tammy - http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Ftammyjennings.blogspot.com%2F&h=a4a0e

Melin - http://papercraftingworld.blogspot.com/

Celeste - http://www.touchedbyabutterfly.blogspot.com/

John - http://meyer-imports.typepad.com/

 

Have fun hopping!  Please become a follower of my blog – and the others on the hop would like you to follow them too!  We ALL love comments too!

Confirmation Sunday…… and School is OUT for Summer!

Hi All!   Well, my 10 year old twin girls and my 13 year old son are out of school now for the summer. Tuesday was their last day.  Griffin’s tradition for the last 3 years or so has been to blast the song by Alice Cooper – “School’s Out.” Crazy, huh?  Where did he learn this?  Well, being that his father and I are children of the 80’s we are crazy enough to own the Muppet Show DVD collection.  One of the episodes features Alice Cooper himself as the host.  One of his songs on the show was indeed “School’s Out.” It is so funny!  I am not an Alice Cooper fan but my husband was/is.  In fact for our 13th wedding anniversary we had front row seats to see Alice Cooper.  It wasn’t too bad. I actually knew more songs than I thought I would – THAT might have been the scariest part!

Funny thing is that I have learned from my pastor at church that Alice Cooper is the son of a preacher.  And that he IS a Christian.  He has been interviewed many times stating that he is a Christian and that he is not, nor never was a Devil worshipper.  He does not condone such practices either.  He has really cleaned up his act and it is all “for show”.  Well… ok.  So for your viewing pleasure, lets go back 32 years to 1978 and watch!  Click on this link Alice Cooper @ the Muppets - School's Out  

And…. since I was on the subject of Christianity (sort of ) let me share with you the other highlight of last weekend for myself and my family.  Griffin was confirmed at our church, DeWitt Lutheran Fellowship.  We are so proud of him.  He learned a lot in the last 2 years.  At our church, being confirmed is no easy task.  The young confirmands have to do much memorization and question answering right in front of the whole congregation!  This year they were able to write an essay and read it to the congregation if the memorization made them too nervous.  It was very intense and detailed.  They each had 2 topics.  When they were finished they each received their new personally engraved Bibles and a few of the Elders came up to pray with them/ for them.  It was a wonderful and proud moment.

We were very lucky to share this special day with most of the Lenth family from up north and my parents who are a little closer to us.  We also had many friends from various aspects of our lives, who came to witness the ceremony.  It was wonderful.

I will share a few pictures with you here:

Griffin is the tall boy in the blue shirt right smack in the middle!  LOL

 

Long time family friends!     and       one of our newest and dearest friends!

        

Griffin with his sisters (yes, the girls are really twins)    And this is Griffin with the stash of beautiful cards!

   

Here he is with the Lenth family                         And our little family of 5…..

And lastly, my parents and James’ parents and James and I with Griffin

Thank you for taking a moment to let me share this with you, too!

 

It’s Show Time!

Well, Gretchen has worked hard all week during dress rehearsal for her dance recital.  Tonight is night one and she has a few fans that will be in the audience (besides her mom and sister!).  We are so proud of her.  What a change from the tiny girl who wanted her “reward” from Gigi during senior awards 7 years ago.  Tonight will be her stage debut as a member of the Ambassador Dance Team.

Here are a few pictures from rehearsal:  (I got a new camera and didn’t have time to learn to use it properly.  I hope I have better luck tonight)

Busy, Busy, Busy!

The title of this post says it all for me this week!  My 10 year old daughter, Gretchen has her 7th dance recital this weekend.  This week we have had dance lessons already and one of two nights of rehearsal.  She dances at a Christian Dance Studio.  We love it. She started with her twin sister Gillian when they were 3 1/2.  However, Sissy stopped dancing a few years back.  Gretchen plans to dance all the way til she graduates high school.

Here are a few pics of the girls over the course of the years:

THESE ARE FROM 2010 RECITAL – (Gretchen)

Here are the pictures that I used to make an album for their teacher for the first 4 years for Gillian and first 5 for Gretchen:

My Completed Challenges for Creative Scrapbooking Divas

I finally got some solid scrapbook time in this weekend.  The whole Mother’s Day thing is what did it for me, if you want to know! LOL  Breakfast in bed served by 3 singing children and a day where mom gets to do anything she wants and “ we won’t fight, whine or be negative, mom”.

So here are the fruits of my labor.  We have many more challenges than those shown on the blog hop on Saturday.  Stop by Creative Scrapbooking Divas and tell them DT Ann sent you!

1st we have a layout for the Mom and Me BOM (Book of Me) Group.  This is me at 2 mos. in April, 1967, with my mom.  The layout was inspired from a layout in the June/July issue of Creating Keepsakes Magazine.  The patterned paper that makes up the paper quilt and all of the chipboard embellishments and the sticker boarder are from the new line from Crate Paper called Emma’s Doll Shoppe.

The next layout is from Stephanie’s Royal Wedding Themed Challenge – Something Old, New, Borrowed and Blue.

The layout on the top is my “Borrowed” and is an Anna Griffin ad in the June/July 2011 Creating Keepsakes Magazine.  My “old” is the paper used in the layout on the right. It is an old Bo Bunny kit that I have had for over 2 years.  My “new” is the technique that I used which was the layered banners that shows the title of Griffin.  The journaling says “you are my bright and shining star.”  And I think you all can see the “blue” in the layout. LOL.  This is a pic of my baby boy, Griffin at age 3 1/2 in 2001.  He just now turned 13 in February, 2011

 

This layout is from Yolie’s  One Photo Challenge.  The paper and embellishments are from Cosmo Cricket.  The picture is from 4 1/2 years ago.  This shows my children and my brother’s only children at that time.  This was the only meeting that the 5 of them have ever had.  And yes, there are 2 sets of twins there- my girls are fraternal twins and his boys are identical twins.  You can see the title : “No Baby for Me?” is what my blondie twin was saying to the photographer.  No matter how much she complained, she never got to hold a baby in the picture.  This the best shot that was taken.  Sweet Gretchen was unhappy in all of them and the babies really had a hard time sitting still and we never did get smiles from them.

 

CSDivas National Scrapbooking Day Blog Hop- A Diva Mansion Tour

Welcome to the Creative Scrapbooking Diva Mansion Tour!   To celebrate National Scrapbooking Day, May 7th, we wanted to share with you the wonderful groups of CSDivas.

"Creative Scrapbooking Divas is ... a place for Divas to inspire, create and enjoy the process! We encourage members to create, try different things, challenge themselves and enjoy the process. At CSDivas we don't sell anything, we have monthly challenges with RAKs offered, Sponsered grand prize, great camaraderie, and we like to Spotlight our members and their fabulous creations. Most of all we want our Diva members to have fun!!!"

We have 8 Design Team Divas aka tour guides to give you a taste of what is offered at the Diva Mansion.  If you are just joining us now, you are in the right place because this is the beginning!

Our Tour List:

Ann- Gadgets/Mixin Up-Ann's Scraps of Time (You Are Here)

Yolie- Traditional Layout- JustYolie, JustCreate (Next Stop)

Sandy- Cards/Cricut- ScrapBook Blessings

Vanessa- Faithbooking- Creating Sensations

Alecia- Cookbooking- Welcome to Alecia's

Stephanie- Technique-  The Magic of Ordinary Days

Pam- Mini album/BOM- Dreamer's Klub

Luisa- Gift ideas- Creative Designs by Luisa

Please show some love and leave a comment for each DT Diva, some are offering a cute little RAK!  You can also get entered in the Grand Prize drawing from CSDivas....

a) new members who complete their profile, upload their picture and post their Introduction  and

b) Already members, posting a NEW project to any of the groups by midnight May 7th.

In both cases please post a comment and/or upload your project here: DIVAS MANSION TOUR BLOG HOP THREAD! So we can keep good track of players who earn a ticket for the Grand Prize!

Now onto my Mansion "Room" to tour.......

Hi Hoppers!   I have 2 “rooms” in the Diva Mansion: The Gadget Guru and the Mixin’ It Up group. 

The Gadget Guru Group is the place to go to check out what kind of fun tools and gadgets are being introduced.

My 2nd stop on my portion of the tour will be to the Mixin’ It Up group. 

This group is designed to help you think outside the box on your pages. Each of the challenges that I post here will involve a "recipe". Just as a recipe when you cook involves the mixing of ingredients, so does a scrapbook recipe.

Here are a few of my favorite challenges we have done:

Here are the ingredients:

1.) You MUST use the word GO in your layout/card.  This should be the theme as well.

2) Use 1 printed piece of paper.

3) use a quote either printed, hand written, on vellum, stickers etc.

Here is my take on it  

And here is my very first Challenge in this group….

Challenge # 1 Recipe from 2010

(yields 1 12 x 12 layout)

Use at least 3 different ribbons (any size or color)

Mix in 2 circles

add 1 photograph

use strips of paper for your journaling

sprinkle with flowers as desired

note: flowers look very nice when button centers are used

finish buttons with "thread" (optional)

 

Thanks for taking the tour of my room and your next stop is JustYolie, JustCreate 

The Gadget Guru

Save the Date–May 7 is National Scrapbooking Day– We are Having a Blog Hop!

 

Announcing our May 7 Blog Hop to celebrate National Scrapbooking Day!  Join the Design Team Members at Creative Scrapbooking Divas for

a Diva’s Mansion Tour Blog Hop!  Check back here for the line up.  I will be posting that and all the goodies to be given away!

Details coming soon!  Hope to see you on our Tour!

How Was Your Ressurection Sunday / Easter Weekend?

My family was scattered a bit over our Easter holiday.  The kids were off school Thursday – Monday.  One went to the Northern Iowa grandparents’ Wednesday night and was suppose to come home today.  Poor thing called Thursday night at 10:45 pm and was crying her eyes out.  She was homesick.  She is 10 and was the last of the kids I would have expected to get this call from.  The whole thing was her idea to go up there.  Alas, grandma and grandpa are in their mid 80’s and don’t have internet or expanded cable so she got a little bored.  She said she read all 5 books she brought and was tired of playing solitaire.  Poor thing.

The hubby and son had to cancel their camping trip due to rain, so they were here until Saturday, when they went up to join Gretchen.

Gillian (the other twin girl) and I stayed here with our dog Charlie, who is not allowed to go to the NE Iowa family’s house.  He was wrongly accused of soiling a piece of furniture almost 5 years ago.  He has never done it before or since so I really don’t think he was guilty.  Nonetheless, it is hard to find someone to take care of him, though he is really a good dog; and we just can’t pay to have him boarded all the time.  Gillian and I visited my aunt after church on Sunday and had Taco John’s for lunch, her choice .

We were invited to a most excellent Sunday Evening Dinner at our Pastors’ house.  That is plural because they are father and son.  We were at the “elder” pastor’s house and were treated to an unbelievable meal.  It was like a gourmet dinner – grilled beef loin, walnut and fetta salad, grilled asparagus; the WORKS!  They were so kind to offer their hospitality when learning that Gillian and I were home alone.  Gillian had a great time as well as the “junior” pastor has a daughter that is in her grade.  It was also a treat because Gretchen wasn’t there to “hog” young Catherine’s attention!  LOL  All kidding aside, I am so greatful for that invitation.  Dinner was great and so was the movie!  Thank you!!!

Here is a picture of the cards I whipped up before we went over to their house.  I apologize because the lighting is bad and I took the picture with my cell phone.  The cards were made with pink and blue paper.  It was all cut out on my Cricut Imagine machine. I used pop dots to pop up the bunny and the grass and flowers.  I used Stickles to decorate the eggs and flowers and grass. 

This is also for the Eggstravaganza Challenge at Creative Scrapbooking Divas  Please join the challenge, you still have time! 

Thanks for stopping by!  Remember, I really do love and appreciate comments. I read them all!

Book of Me Challenge–School is Cool!

Hi followers!  I want to share a challenge that is happening at Creative Scrapbook Divas right now. I hope you will join DT Pam in this.  It is Book of Me Challenge - School is Cool!

Pam did a great job and you will have to visit the group to see.

I am showing you my layout for the challenge.  It is from 3rd grade in 1975.  I will also show a few others I have done.  I don’t use a school theme really.  I just pick paper I like for those portraits.

I hope you will join us!

 

here are some others I already had done:

1970

 

 

1972

 

1973

 

1974

 

I wonder what happened to 1971?